Online through June 15, 2015
You’re invited!
Tune in to VDB TV, a rotating series of groundbreaking programs presenting essential video art, streaming free for the first time to the general public on the Video Data Bank website. From early media pioneers, to sensational contemporary artists, VDB TV provides unprecedented access to the culturally significant VDB archive of over 6,000 video art titles. VDB TV is curated by prominent programmers and moving image art specialists from around the world, bringing you an astounding range of moving image art!
Current program:
The Feminist Origins: Video Data Bank’s On Art and Artists Interview Collection
VDB TV launches with a program devoted to the feminist origins of VDB’s historical On Art and Artists interview collection. In April 1974, Video Data Bank co-founders Lyn Blumenthal and Kate Horsfield conducted their first taped interview, an in-depth conversation with art historian and curator Marcia Tucker. During the remainder of that year, Blumenthal and Horsfield interviewed four more notable art world women: Lucy Lippard, Agnes Martin, Joan Mitchell, and Ree Morton. Seen together, these five interviews mark a seminal moment in the history of 20th century art, a moment in which women artists were increasingly being asked to define and position their practice within the growing feminist movement. In this program, each interviewee personally defines her experience as an artist, and discusses the influence of feminism on her own life. Keep coming back to VDB TV for more exciting programming!
Upcoming highlights include a radical selection from the Videofreex Archive, and an exciting program of contemporary video art works curated by Brooklyn Rail film editors Rachael A. Rakes and Leo Goldsmith.
Support for VDB TV
In conjunction with the launch of VDB TV, we are pleased to announce that Video Data Bank has been awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to support the project. VDB Executive Director Abina Manning says, “All of us at VDB are thrilled to be recipients of an NEA award for VDB TV. We’ve long desired to make more of the collection available to the general public, while also ensuring that included artists are fairly compensated for their work. NEA support is finally allowing us to fulfill that goal, and we’re excited to create some amazing programming for audiences interested in moving image art!”
VDB TV is supported in part by a Media Arts award from the National Endowment for the Arts. To find out more about how NEA grants impact individuals and communities, visit www.arts.gov.
About Video Data Bank
Founded at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) in 1976 at the inception of the media arts movement, the Video Data Bank (VDB) is a leading resource in the United States for video by and about contemporary artists. The VDB Collection includes the work of more than 550 artists and 6,000 video art titles, 3,000+ in active distribution.
The VDB makes its Collection available to museums, galleries, educational institutions, libraries, cultural institutions and other exhibitors through a national and international distribution service. VDB works to foster a deeper understanding of video art, and to broaden access and exposure to media art histories through its programs and activities. These include preservation of historically important works of video art, the perpetuation of analog and digital archives, publishing of curated programs and artists’ monographs, the commissioning of essays and texts that contextualize artists’ work, and an extensive range of public programs.
